Call for Participation: Be a Co-Curator! Archives & Special CollectionsEye of the Beholder 3: One Image, Many Perspectives, October 1, 2010-?

September 2010. The exhibit challenge to participants: to take the image above and provide an interpretation from their own perspective. Professional, personal, anything.

THE EXHIBIT: Archives & Special Collections is mounting an exhibit to demonstrate how a single item: this image in particular, could be used/interpreted/described in a variety of ways based on the viewer’s knowledge, skills, and areas of interest. If you’d like to alter the image in some way as all of or a part of your interpretation, we’d welcome that as well.

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: Deadline for submissions is September 27, 2010. We seek specialists in any field to provide their interpretation of this image for use in the exhibit. What do you have to say about this image? Would you like to interpret it from your own area of expertise whether it be scientific, historical, sports, fashion, or meteorological? Or anything else? Are you a graphic artist who would like to take the image and alter it and use it in some way? Does it prompt a story, a poem, a song, a sculpture? Or an Op-Ed piece? Submit entries to our email using the Contact Us link below. Please provide your name, title, and email address, and short description of your own perspective or specialization. Or drop it by the Archives between 10-4, M-F. For a better view of the image, click on the above photograph. If you need a high resolution tiff image to do your work, please contact the Archives using our Contact Us link below.

The Archives will retain all submissions as part of the exhibit file. An online version of the exhibit will be posted at a later date.

SPOILER ALERT: if you prefer to interpret the photograph without additional information, do not continue reading on this page!

The exact caption for the photograph is: Denali Ski Patrol Members.

The photograph was probably taken in 1941. The location is unclear, might have been Curry, Anchorage, or another site in Southcentral Alaska.

The photographer was Russell Dow. Russ Dow came to Alaska in 1933 on one of Bradford Washburn’s glacial expeditions: Washburn sometimes recruited expedition members from collegiate skiers and Russ had been on the ski team for Dartmouth. He returned to Alaska to stay in 1936.

The individuals in the photograph are unidentified with one exception: Russ is in the middle of the line-up wearing a dark cap and light jacket.

The woman on the right of the image is wearing an Anchorage Ski Club patch on her jacket.